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DVD Midnight Cowboy
The first, and only, X-rated film to win a best picture Academy Award, John Schlesinger's Midnight Cowboy seems a lot less daring today (and has been reclassified as an R), but remains a fascinating time capsule of late-1960s sexual decadence in mainstream American cinema. In a career-making performance, Jon Voight plays Joe Buck, a naive Texas dishwasher who goes to the big city (New York) to make his fortune as a sexual hustler. Although enthusiastic about selling himself to rich ladies for stud services, he quickly finds it hard to make a living and eventually crashes in a seedy dump with a crippled petty thief named Ratzo Rizzo (Dustin Hoffman, doing one of his more effective "stupid acting tricks," with a limp and a high-pitch rasp of a voice). Schlesinger's quick-cut, semi-psychedelic style has dated severely, as has his ruthlessly cynical approach to almost everybody but the lead characters. But at its heart the movie is a sad tale of friendship between a couple of losers lost in the big city, and with an ending no studio would approve today. It's a bit like an urban Of Mice and Men, but where both guys are Lenny. --Jim Emerson
a great film, shows the roughness of live and the great ways friendship can surprise you. love dustin hoffman in this film, in my opinion his best role ever. hes a lovable, homeless cripple that meets a cowboy that moves to NYC. they strike up an unusual friendship. funny and sad, HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!
best so far
I've been particularly impressed with how fast I received this item. I looked at the cost of mailing it and noticed that it was more than what I was charged for, whereas typically someone would make some small amount in S&H. These guys lost money to mail it to me faster! Now that's service! Thank you.
Genre Item in Disguise
The film is structured along familiar genre lines, basically it's a rape-revenge picture, only disguised at either end. So the back story is kept from us for a while, and thus we have no idea of the horrors Joe Buck left back home, nor what has driven him into this short-sighted, pathetic lifestyle of hoping to service women sexually on Times Square, Once the revelation happens, and we discover the shocking secret of Joe's oast, and that of his girlfriend, played so beautifully by the one and only Jennifer Salt, we sympathize. (Apparently Salt was the daughter of MIDNIGHT COWBOY's screenwriter, Waldo Salt, and all you can think of is, he wrote this part for his daughter? Something weird there.)
As Annie, Jennifer Salt does wonders with a small role. Most famous for her long running "Eunice Tate" on the popular TV sitcom SOAP, she also starred in four Brian De Palma films, most notably SISTERS in which she plays the intrepid reporter Grace Collier who tries to penetrate the Margot Kidder mystery. As Annie, she has a more naturalistic role, clearly inspired by the then-notorious Caryl Chessman, who was executed for crimes committed at Lover's Lanes in California.
Later, when Joe gets more and more perturbed about being a hustler, he has a dramatic encounter with a gay man and a heavy telephone. You can see clearly that Joe is seeking revenge for his own rape (if that's what it was; Schlesinger's photography all but covers up the ghastly deed, as though it belonged in the shadows) and we all know that the cycle of abuse never ends.
When you consider how affected Hoffnan and Voight both became in their acting, the freshness and lightness of their performances here is a wonder. They're still great, but their tricks are no longer new. However in MIDNIGHT COWBOY they achieve the kind of screen greatness we think of as emanating from the actors in Renoir films.
Few films have defined a generation as The Graduate did. The alienation, the nonconformity, the intergenerational romance, the blissful Simon and Garfunkel soundtrack--they all served to lob a cultural grenade smack into the middle of 1967 America, ultimately making the film the third most profitable up to that time. Seen from a later perspective, its radical chicness has dimmed a bit, yet it's still a joy to see Dustin Hoffman's bemused Benjamin and Anne Bancroft's deliciously decadent, sardonic Mrs. Robinson. The script by Buck Henry and Calder Willingham is still offbeat and dryly funny, and Mike Nichols, who won an Oscar for his direction, has just the right, light touch. --Anne HurleyMore Info about this DVD Actor(s): Anne Bancroft - Dustin Hoffman Director(s): Mike Nichols DVD Release Date: Released the 19 June 2001 This item is currently not available.
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One of the key movies of the 1970s, when exciting, groundbreaking, personal films were still being made in Hollywood, Milos Forman's One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest emphasized the humanistic story at the heart of Ken Kesey's more hallucinogenic novel. Jack Nicholson was born to play the part of Randle Patrick McMurphy, the rebellious inmate of a psychiatric hospital who fights back against the authorities' cold attitudes of institutional superiority, as personified by Nurse Ratched (Louise Fletcher). It's the classic antiestablishment tale of one man asserting his individuality in the face of a repressive, conformist system--and it works on every level. Forman populates his film with memorably eccentric faces, and gets such freshly detailed and spontaneous work from his ensemble... More Info about this DVD Director(s): Milos Forman DVD Release Date: Released the 24 September 2002 Usually ships in 24 hours
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Roman Polanski's brooding film noir exposes the darkest side of the land of sunshine, the Los Angeles of the 1930s, where power is the only currency--and the only real thing worth buying. Jack Nicholson is J.J. Gittes, a private eye in the Chandler mold, who during a routine straying-spouse investigation finds himself drawn deeper and deeper into a jigsaw puzzle of clues and corruption. The glamorous Evelyn Mulwray (a dazzling Faye Dunaway) and her titanic father, Noah Cross (John Huston), are at the black-hole center of this tale of treachery, incest, and political bribery. The crackling, hard-bitten script by Robert Towne won a well-deserved Oscar, and the muted color cinematography makes the goings-on seem both bleak and impossibly vibrant. Polanski himself has a brief, memorable cameo... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Faye Dunaway - John Huston - Jack Nicholson DVD Release Date: Released the 23 November 1999 Usually ships in 24 hours
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Annie Hall is one of the truest, most bittersweet romances on film. In it, Allen plays a thinly disguised version of himself: Alvy Singer, a successful--if neurotic--television comedian living in Manhattan. Annie (the wholesomely luminous Dianne Keaton) is a Midwestern transplant who dabbles in photography and sings in small clubs. When the two meet, the sparks are immediate--if repressed. Alone in her apartment for the first time, Alvy and Annie navigate a minefield of self-conscious "is-this-person-someone-I'd-want-to-get-involved-with?" conversation. As they speak, subtitles flash their unspoken thoughts: the likes of "I'm not smart enough for him" and "I sound like a jerk." Despite all their caution, they connect, and we're swept up in the flush of their new romance. Allen's... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Diane Keaton DVD Release Date: Released the 30 May 2000 Usually ships in 24 hours
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This box-office hit from 1969 is an important pioneer of the American independent cinema movement, and a generational touchstone to boot. Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper play hippie motorcyclists crossing the Southwest and encountering a crazy quilt of good and bad people. Jack Nicholson turns up in a significant role as an attorney who joins their quest for awhile and articulates society's problem with freedom as Fonda's and Hopper's characters embody it. Hopper directed, essentially bringing the no-frills filmmaking methods of legendary, drive-in movie producer Roger Corman (The Little Shop of Horrors) to a serious feature for the mainstream. The film can't help but look a bit dated now (a psychedelic sequence toward the end particularly doesn't hold up well), but it retains its... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Dennis Hopper - Peter Fonda - Jack Nicholson Director(s): Dennis Hopper DVD Release Date: Released the 07 December 1999 Usually ships in 24 hours
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